Old JD 455 mower reliability

[4570Man]

I recently bought a 20 year old JD455 on eBay. But I can't turn the PTO off. The mower starts OK and the seat safety switch has been bypassed. The blades turn all the time. I took it to a mower shop who tried a new PTO solenoid which they said didn't work, so they gave up, charged me $120 and gave me the mower back saying the problem was internal. Does anyone have any suggestions? Thanks.

How do the blades engage on this model? The church I mow for has one of these and it’s got an electric switch to engage so I’d guess it’s got an electric clutch on the front of the motor. If that’s the case you’ve either got a short in the wiring or the clutch is bad.

 

[Kish318420]

The switch activates a solenoid on the hydro to turn on the PTO on the hydro, then the shaft runs from the hydro to the mid mount mower deck